It Will Always Be Disney, My Dudes
So Disney recently followed through with its shutdown of the popular children’s social media game/website Club Penguin. And while you may be asking why I would care seeing as I haven’t logged onto the site in almost a decade, it still hits home hard.
I very fondly remember spending rainy days online at places like the tube races or the infamous iceberg (which finally tipped and I am livid I wasn’t there to experience it).
Sure, I may have never opened my penguin’s igloo in years, but I always could. Until now.
Now, that chapter of my childhood is officially closed and no matter how much I want to see it again, I never can. They say you never truly appreciate something until it’s gone.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not blaming Disney for the shutdown. It was a wise economic decision as kids play more mobile-based games now than my generation when the Internet was all the rage to satisfy our gaming needs. Club Penguin is being replaced with a mobile version of the game called Club Penguin Island.
I could probably make an account for this new game, but the experience just would not be the same as it was for 10-year old me.
This makes me realize something bittersweet. My generation, the tail end of the millennials, is finally reaching the stage where all of our childhood/pre-teen/teenage comforts are being closed out of our lives--whether because we are “too old” for them or (like Club Penguin) not enough people have continued to use them, making them obsolete.
How fitting, then, that this ties into Disney.
Disney has always (and perhaps will always) have a connection with children. Little kids hoping to dress up like Elsa or Mr. Incredible for Halloween are the primary group Disney films and products are made for. At one point in our lives, we were all in this market.
However, the dilemma my age group currently faces is this: we know we are no longer in this target of Disney media, but still vividly remember the joy we had when we were.
Heck, it was only a few years ago that we flooded theaters to watch Frozen for the second time, proving our absolute dedication to the brand.
But it isn’t socially acceptable for us to do that anymore. We’ve grown up too much. We don’t do the same drugs anymore (tbt to that first blog post). We’re “old.”
That’s why the shutdown of Club Penguin stings so much. It is the closing of a door to our pasts of which I am sure many others will also do down the road.
So what is there to do? I believe the only left to do is think back fondly on the hours spent in the game or in a Disney gift shop, marveling at the newest additions to the princess line up or the sense of absolute wonder experienced when we set foot for the first time in Magic Kingdom--to not forget the slice of Disney we experiences as our generation (which was prime Disney Renaissance, I might add). The sweet in this bittersweet.
And that’s what this blog has been all about: acting as a primer to spur those memories of times past. Remembering what it was like to watch Aladdin for the first time or how empowering “I’ll Make A Man Out Of You” feels every time you listen to it. I hope to help those memories live on. I hope every avenue of Disney we have isn’t lost with the closing of each of these relics from our childhood. I hope they aren’t forgotten.
Am I being over-dramatic? What’s all the hub-bub about? Why does all this even matter? Well to put it simply, It’s Disney, My Dudes.